This series examines reasons why apostasy happens in a church, ministry, or Christian educational institution; how Christians can recognize it; and what must be done to avoid it. It is based on the chapter titled "How Did It Happen?" in the book Christianity and Neo-Liberalism by TeachingTheWord president Paul M. Elliott (Trinity Foundation, 2005). This is the last article of the series.

Those who lead churches into apostasy rely on the cooperation or inaction of the doctrinally indifferent to carry out their agenda. We find this pattern repeated throughout church history. The cooperation or inaction of the doctrinally indifferent has often permitted apostates who began as numerical minorities or even single individuals to exert strong influence on churches and denominations, leading them astray.

Identifying the Indifferent

Who are the doctrinally indifferent? It would be inaccurate to say that these people are merely generally indifferent, that is, apathetic. The doctrinally indifferent do care about other things. Their watchword is tolerance. They see controversy as one of the greatest evils, and they see tolerance of varying views under one big tent as the way to avoid controversy, the way to put aside seemingly petty strife and focus on the greater good.

We must all trust one another and work together, they say, even though we differ on basic doctrine (or, as they like to say, "we express the same doctrine differently"). Doctrinal disputes are an airing of dirty laundry that must be avoided. We must, they say, go along to get along for the greater good. The pluralism and relativism of the secular mind dominate their thinking, and this produces spiritual indifference in matters of doctrine. Intolerance of error becomes the only intolerable.

Like Pontius Pilate and the careless Gallio of Achaia (Acts 18:12-17), the doctrinally indifferent seek at all costs to avoid taking clear positions on the most vital issues. They refuse to stand positively for authentic Christianity and against counterfeits. Yet by "taking no position" they do take one. By consistently refusing to take the side of those who seek to propagate and defend authentic Biblical Christianity, they have consistently given aid and comfort to the enemies of Christ.

An Example From Recent Church History

Dr. J. Gresham Machen fought doctrinal indifference in the Presbyterian church of the 1920s and 30s. A document called the Auburn Affirmation, signed by only about 15% of the denomination's ordained ministers, became the rallying point for liberalism. The Auburn Affirmation denied the inerrancy of Scripture, Christ's virgin birth, His miracles, His atonement for sin as the only means of salvation, and His bodily resurrection. The relatively small minority of men who signed the Auburn Affirmation were soon able to exert majority control of the church with the aid and comfort of the doctrinally indifferent. Machen's description of the doctrinally indifferent of his day is timeless:

.[I]t is undoubtedly true that in many quarters there is a most lamentable ignorance regarding the greatest issue of the day [authentic Biblical Christianity versus the liberalism of the Auburn Affirmation's signers]. Such ignorance, with the indifference to which it gives rise, is sometimes very disheartening to those who are contending for the faith..

Far more serious, however.is the injury to the souls of the indifferent people themselves. In very many cases, people who decry controversy have already lost, or are in process of losing, their own hold upon the great verities of the faith. They may not be conscious of relinquishing a single doctrine or a single fact that the Bible records. But the trouble is that what is not consciously given up in their minds has been removed from their hearts; they live only on the periphery of the Christian religion, and the really great things are lost from view. By such persons, whether in the pulpit or in the pew, the Gospel is not indeed denied. But what is almost a worse thing than that is done - the Gospel is not denied, but is simply ignored.¹

In Machen's time as in ours, the doctrinally indifferent simply wanted peace at any price. When the controversy over the Auburn Affirmation was beginning to rage in 1924, Dr. Charles Erdman was elected moderator of the Presbyterian Church General Assembly on this platform: "We need a moderator who stands for presenting a united front rather than the encouragement of controversy." Erdman himself said this: "I want the constructive work of the [church] to go on without interruption on account of any doctrinal controversy." Machen responded:

It would be impossible to put in any clearer way than is here done by Dr. Erdman the position of doctrinal indifferentism. And it would be impossible to imagine a position to which I am more conscientiously and more profoundly opposed. How can the constructive work of the [church] go on without interruption on account of any doctrinal controversy? The thing for which the [church] exists, I hold, is the propagation of a certain doctrine that we call the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Only in that doctrine is Christ offered to men as their Savior. The church might do many other things - it might tinker with social conditions, it might use all sorts of palliative measures with men who have not been born again - but only by persuading men to accept the blessed "doctrine" or Gospel can it save human souls. The church, I hold, is in the world to propagate a message; and if its propagation of the message is not clear, then, whatever else it does, it cannot possibly he said to be engaged in its "constructive work."²

Within a few years after he wrote those words, Machen and others who stood with him were expelled from the church as troublemakers.

Today the doctrinally indifferent in many churches occupy the same position as their counterparts eighty-five years ago. Because they shun controversy over doctrine, and prize a false peace and counterfeit unity at all costs, they are often willingly ignorant of the facts of the present crisis of sound doctrine within Reformed and Evangelical churches. There are none so blind as those who will not see. In many cases they themselves have lost their grasp of the message of the Gospel and other fundamentals of the faith.

Often today the "greater good" that the doctrinally indifferent seek is church growth at any price under the guise of "evangelism" falsely so called. The doctrinally indifferent who advocate this kind of evangelism refuse to recognize and act upon two central, Biblical facts: 1.) There can be no evangelism without the Evangel - the authentic Gospel of Jesus Christ. 2.) There can be no real church growth unless those who are being added to the visible church are truly saved by the power of the authentic Gospel.

When doctrinal indifference opens wide the door to cheap substitutes for the Gospel that produce false converts, it does not take long for those false converts to exert influence and eventually become the majority in a church. The real message of the "come as you are" false evangelism of our time is that the unsaved can "stay as you are" within the affirming environment of a church that has lost its spiritual power.

Authentic Christianity Is Not Doctrinally Indifferent

We find many warnings against doctrinal indifference in the pages of God's Word, including these:

Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power (Colossians 2:8-10).

Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called "Today," lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said: "Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion" (Hebrews 3:12-15).

...that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head - Christ (Ephesians 4:14-15).

Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless; and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation - as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked; but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen (2 Peter 3:14-18).

References:

1. J. Gresham Machen, "What Is the Gospel?" in J. Gresham Machen: Selected Shorter Writings (Phillipsburg, New Jersey: P&R Publishing, 2004), pages 124-125.

2. J. Gresham Machen, "Statement to the Committee to Investigate Princeton," in J. Gresham Machen: Selected Shorter Writings, 306-307.

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